Ouch, Penn State. They’d already pulled down Joe Paterno’s statue, which surprised me. Now I see the NCAA has hit them with a real penalty.

The NCAA has hit Penn State with a $60 million sanction, a four-year football postseason ban and a vacation of all wins dating to 1998, the organization said Monday morning.

The career record of Joe Paterno will reflect these vacated records, the NCAA said.

Penn State must also reduce 10 initial and 20 total scholarships each year for a four-year period. …

…The Penn State athletic program will also be put on five-year probation and must work with an athletic-integrity monitor of NCAA’s chosing.

More from the power corrupts, etc., department — Business Week has an eye-opening article on How the Mormons Make Money. A snip:

It’s perhaps unsurprising that Mormonism, an indigenous American religion, would also adopt the country’s secular faith in money. What is remarkable is how varied the church’s business interests are and that so little is known about its financial interests. Although a former Mormon bishop is about to receive the Republican Party’s presidential nomination, and despite a recent public-relations campaign aimed at combating the perception that it is “secretive,” the LDS Church remains tight-lipped about its holdings. It offers little financial transparency even to its members, who are required to tithe 10 percent of their income to gain access to Mormon temples. …

… Mormons make up only 1.4 percent of the U.S. population, but the church’s holdings are vast. First among its for-profit enterprises is DMC, which reaps estimated annual revenue of $1.2 billion from six subsidiaries, according to the business information and analysis firm Hoover’s Company Records (DNB). Those subsidiaries run a newspaper, 11 radio stations, a TV station, a publishing and distribution company, a digital media company, a hospitality business, and an insurance business with assets worth $3.3 billion.

Hmm, vast wealth, little transparency or accountability, mixed up with religion. Is there anyone here who doesn’t think this will blow up into a mega-scandal someday?

Awhile back I read a book about the Mormons called Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer. It is gripping, and disturbing. All manner of whackjob religions and spiritualisms emerged in the late 19th century, for some reason, and Mormonism is but one example. But it’s the most successful one, possibly because it has evolved to become more acceptable to mainstream culture.

I’m not saying the Mormons are a menace to society, but even for a religion it’s a tad out of whack. The faithful are taught to be obedient and to keep the church’s secrets from outsiders, even if they have to lie. Mormonism rather than chicanery may be at the root of Mittens’s reluctance to reveal his tax returns. And that’s a recipe for internal corruption.